Good To Be Back…

I am back from Seattle where my jinx on visiting baseball teams continued to obtain.  I was supposed to see 3 games over the weekend; through a series of miscommunications and logistical flubs that would have scuttled the D-Day invasion, I only got to see 1 game.  Here are the weekend results:

• The Mariners lost 4 of 5 games to the Angels.  Indeed, I was in the stands for the single victory.
• In the 4 losses, the Mariners scored a total of 3 runs and were shut out twice.  When I was in the park, they scored 8 runs and won handily.

This “tradition” of visiting friends in Seattle with the additional intent of seeing Mariners’ baseball games began sometime between 2002 and 2004.  Since then, I have seen the Mariners go 26-17 which projects to a season-long record of 98-64.  Consider that record in line with these facts:

• Since 2002, the Mariners have never won 98 games in a single season.
• Since 2002, the Mariners have won 90 or more games in a single season only 3 times.
• Since 2002, the Mariners have been above .500 only 8 times.

I have said that the Mariners should pay me to come visit several times a season.  Maybe other AL West teams should pay me to stay home?

While I was gone, FIFA announced the 16 cities in North America that will host World Cup games in 2026.  Two cities in Canada and three cities in Mexico will host games; the rest are in the US.  I was a bit surprised to see that Chicago was not on the list to host any games.  I would have thought that a city with more than 2.5M in population in addition to being a city represented in MLS would have gotten a nod.  C’est la vie…

I also read that Marv Levy has been elected to the Canadian Football Hall of Fame in Hamilton, Ontario.  Levy is already in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, OH meaning that he will be only the third person to be inducted into both Halls of Fame.  The other two are:

1. Bud Grant
2. Warren Moon

Congratulations to Marv Levy…

The US Open golf tournament came and went over the weekend.  In the coverage leading up to and in the early rounds, there were several references to the LIV golfers as “traitors”.  Can we please put a stop to that nonsense?  For the record:

• Benedict Arnold was a traitor; Dustin Johnson, Phil Mickelson et.al. are not traitors.
• When I was in school, we opened the day with the Pledge of Allegiance.  That pledge was to the flag and the country; that pledge was not to the PGA.

Along that same line of “reasoning”, should anyone consider the NBA as a whole as being “traitorous” because it does hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of business with China?  Saudi Arabia is not a paragon when it comes to human rights to be sure, but neither is China.  So why consider golfers who take Saudi money “traitors” while looking at the NBA as it rakes in money from China and think of the league as “globalizing its brand”?

Another tempest in a teapot seems to be developing here in the DC area.  George Washington University has been wrestling with an issue for the last year or so that has divided the school and its alums.  The issue is the name and mascot for the university and last week the school concluded that it needed to ditch the nickname “Colonials” and find a new one.  [Aside:  A new nickname/mascot will be introduced sometime next year.  Try to contain  yourselves…]  The school stopped short of ditching George Washington’s name notwithstanding the fact that George was indeed a “colonial” for most of his life.

Opponents of that nickname say that “colonials” were people who stole land and plundered resources from indigenous peoples and that “colonials” were bad folks.  If that is the yardstick to be  used here, how can the school change its nickname and keep its official name?  Here are facts:

• George Washington was born in, lived in and fought for colonies to become a nation.
• Washington’s plantation at Mount Vernon belonged to indigenous peoples at some time prior to his taking possession of that land.

If that land exploitation was sufficiently horrible to strip the school of its nickname, how can it possibly retain the name of the specific individual who was a party to such a miscarriage of justice?  If this sort of “logic” continues to spread, the Minnesota Vikings could be next in the cross-hairs…

Finally, with the summer solstice upon us, let me close today with the definition of “Stonehenge” from The Official Dictionary of Sarcasm:

“Stonehenge:  Prehistoric grouping of large standing stones in the English countryside.  Because it is not known how an ancient culture could have constructed Stonehenge, the mysterious site attracts a fair percentage of people who spend most of their free time going to Renaissance Fairs and listening to either ‘Yes” or “King Crimson’.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………